


it's a tragedy, the way our story goes

by thisismetrying



Category: The Queen's Gambit (TV)
Genre: Angst, Drabble, Emotional Hurt, F/M, Hurt, Post-Canon, Post-Moscow (The Queen's Gambit), honestly this is just bad emo poetry, sorry - Freeform, they are so...tragic, yeah it's beth/benny PAIN hours
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-16 18:54:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 637
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29212248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisismetrying/pseuds/thisismetrying
Summary: Beth Harmon was not born a tragedy, but she became one. Somewhere in the middle of her mother driving the car into the bridge and hoarding little half-green pills in her pocket, she became a tragedy.Benny Watts, for the first 24 years of his life, was only a tragedy when he wanted to be, when he wanted to lean into the grungy tortured genius cowboy persona he so carefully cultivated. And then somewhere in between five weeks in New York, he fell in love, and he became a tragedy.Together they are a goddamned tragedy. And their story is this.
Relationships: Beth Harmon/Benny Watts
Comments: 10
Kudos: 29





	it's a tragedy, the way our story goes

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by this famous tumblr quote: https://lostcap.tumblr.com/post/120379329033/its-a-tragedy-the-way-our-story-goes-maybe
> 
> Prepare yourself for bad emo poetry

**_“It’s a tragedy, the way our story goes.”_ **

Beth Harmon was not born a tragedy, but she became one. Somewhere in the middle of her mother driving the car into the bridge and hoarding little half-green pills in her pocket, she became a tragedy.

Benny Watts, for the first 24 years of his life, was only a tragedy when he wanted to be, when he wanted to lean into the grungy tortured genius cowboy persona he so carefully cultivated. And then somewhere in between five weeks in New York, he fell in love, and he became a tragedy.

Together they are a goddamned tragedy. And their story is this:

**_Perhaps._ **

It is, perhaps, the first time in years that another domestic player gives a challenge, a _real_ challenge.

It is three rounds of speed chess that electrifies and excites.

It is an invitation, hesitantly accepted.

It is a belief in genius, in being the best there is.

It is a sighed _“so that’s what it’s supposed to feel like,”_ in the afterglow. Only to be disturbed by a practical piece of advice.

It is touches and kisses and caresses in the night in a basement bedroom with no windows and a thin glass door. It is things that can never live in the daylight.

It is an unreturned _“I miss you.”_

It is the promise of a queen and a king going to Moscow.

It is a broken promise, because it was only ever a perhaps.

It is an opening, it is a queen’s gambit.

**_Maybe._ **

It is a call from New York to Moscow. It is the feeling of people in your corner. It is support and friendship, and maybe, just maybe, love.

It is a ride from Kentucky to New York, idling outside a suburban house for six hours. It is hoping, it is wondering, it is butterflies.

It is leaving after six and a half hours of waiting. It is running away. It is giving up before the worst of the maybes can become true.

It is getting home two hours after a blue beetle pulls away from the house, and neighbors calling about a strange man in a trench coat and a big hat sitting who sat outside for hours.

It is picking up the phone and there is an answer. It is maneuvering pieces around all the things unsaid.

It is asking “what ifs” and finding that, in the end, they don’t matter.

It is a middlegame, where there is still time to change course, still time to do things differently. But it is also a culmination of all the preparation, all the openings, and it cannot quite escape that shadow.

**_Almost._ **

It is almost picking up the phone. It is almost picking up the phone and almost saying everything that was never said. It is almost laying out all the pieces that have been collected, accumulated, from Las Vegas to Cincinnati to New York City to Paris to Moscow to Lexington.

It is almost taking a flight to New York and knocking at the door of a basement apartment.

It is almost driving down to Kentucky again and knocking at the door this time.

It is almost doing all of these things, and not. It is being only almost brave enough to do them.

It is Beth seeing Benny across the room and her heart stops and she feels woozy, like the time she took too many tranquilizers.

It is Benny seeing Beth across the room it’s as if someone stole his knife and stabbed him while looking in his eyes all the while.

It is the haunting of too many “almosts” that never happened.

It is two almost friends, almost lovers, sitting down to a match like strangers.

It is an endgame and the name of the endgame is tragedy.


End file.
